The offering and administration of insurance comprises a well-understood area of practice in that the primary essentials of the business have been well settled for generations. Generally speaking, an insurer agrees to provide monetary compensation to an insured party at such time as the insured party shall experience a covered loss. That said, however, properly configuring an insurance policy for a given insured party can present any number of considerable challenges.
As but one example in this regard, for any given generic insurance risk a given insurer may, or may not, offer corresponding insurance coverage. More particularly, this variability can comprise a function of many factors including, but not limited to, such things as the proposed period of coverage and/or more specific information regarding the insurance risk and/or the party seeking insurance coverage. Coverage availability for a given insurance risk can also vary, for example, as a function of the legal jurisdiction within which the coverage will apply. As one simple example in this regard, laws and regulations regarding insurance coverage requirements and limitations can and do vary greatly from one state to another within the United States.
While circumstances such as these complicate determining coverage availability for a given insurance risk for a given candidate insured party, the problem grows considerably when remembering that a typical modern insurance policy can address a large number of different such insurance risks. When dozens, or even hundreds, of such risks require attention the task of properly configuring a corresponding policy can be difficult. In addition, policies can contain a large number of elements that must be present to exactly characterize the coverage offered by the policy, This, in turn, can require the services of experienced, well trained personnel to ensure proper policy configuration.
Those skilled in the art will further recognize that these difficulties are not limited to only the initial configuration of such a policy. These very same considerations can arise during the life of a given policy (when, for example, local laws or regulations require, or provide an opportunity for, a corresponding change) or at a time of renewing such a policy. Correctly, quickly, and efficiently determining insurance policy element availability is therefore seen to comprise a recurrent cradle-to-grave issue for modern insurers.
Skilled artisans will appreciate that elements in the figures are illustrated for simplicity and clarity and have not necessarily been drawn to scale. For example, the dimensions and/or relative positioning of some of the elements in the figures may be exaggerated relative to other elements to help to improve understanding of various embodiments of the present invention. Also, common but well-understood elements that are useful or necessary in a commercially feasible embodiment are often not depicted in order to facilitate a less obstructed view of these various embodiments of the present invention. It will further be appreciated that certain actions and/or steps may be described or depicted in a particular order of occurrence while those skilled in the art will understand that such specificity with respect to sequence is not actually required. It will also be understood that the terms and expressions used herein have the ordinary technical meaning as is accorded to such terms and expressions by persons skilled in the technical field as set forth above except where different specific meanings have otherwise been set forth herein.